GoldiBlox recruiting girls as engineers

"GoldiBlox: The girls' toy commercial sweeping the Internet"

by

Susan Rohwer

November 21st, 2013

latimes.com

If you haven’t seen it, check out the commercial for GoldiBlox that’s sweeping the Internet. It’s an ad for a set of interactive toys and books that encourages girls to build their own castles rather than wait for princes to come do it for them. In an age when girls’ toys painfully adhere to gender stereotypes, the message in this commercial is clear: Girls want more than princess toys for Christmas.

The commercial opens with three girls watching TV and looking unimpressed with what they’re seeing: other little girls in precious party dresses dancing around a tea set. They switch on their record player, grab their hard hats and tool belts and get to work on a Rube Goldberg apparatus assembled with household items and typical girls’ toys (everything from a tea set to a tiara and a baby doll cradle). The record player plays the Beastie Boys song “Boys,” but it’s been rewritten as “Girls” and it’s now a rallying cry against princess-toy culture: “It’s time for a change, and we deserve to see a range, ‘cause all our toys look just the same, and we would like to use our brains.”

GoldiBlox CEO Debbie Sterling invented the engineering toys tailored specifically to girls after being frustrated by the lack of other female students in her undergraduate engineering program at Stanford University. She spent a year researching how she could create a building toy for girls beyond making it pink. Her research led her to the conclusion that girls tend to have strong verbal skills, that they want to have stories and characters rather than to build for the sake of building. She incorporated these findings into her toy design and GoldiBlox was born.

The goal of GoldiBlox is to “get girls building.” And that is no small task. Women are vastly outnumbered by men in fields such as science and technology, making up only 11% of the world’s engineers. According to a report on women in science and engineering from the National Science Foundation, girls tend to lose interest in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) between the fourth and eighth grades. Discouraging messages from the media, parents and teachers can squash curiosity in STEM. Fostering an enthusiasm in these subjects can spark an interest that could turn into a career.

Studies have shown that the way toys are marketed has an enormous impact on reinforcing gender roles, and toy companies are woefully behind on offering gender-neutral toys. Gender gaps are closing in certain areas, according to a study of more than 4,000 kids in 12 countries done by Marketing Store Worldwide — except in the realm of toys. Boys are much more likely to have construction toys and girls are much more likely to have dolls and stuffed animals.

Although there are toys like the Easy Bake Oven that are now (and only after very pubic pressure) being marketed as gender neutral, some would argue that in the last decade the toy industry has actually increased its gendered marketing. Elizabeth Sweet, a doctoral candidate at UC Davis, researched the gendered marketing of toys in 20th century Sears catalogs and found that although the 1970s showed an increase in gender-neutral marketing of toys, this trend reversed in 1990s. By the end of the 20th century, the gendered marketing of toys had crept back to levels not seen since the 1950s. As Sweet argues, it is even more extreme today.

As any parent who has braved the toy aisles knows, girls and boys are sold vastly different kinds of toys. Girls’ aisles are brimming with pink toys, often geared toward domestic pursuits or beauty, while boys are sold action figures, construction sets and toy guns. But in a sign of a growing unease with such blatant gendering, Toys R Us in Britain recently declared that it would blend all toys together and get rid of the signs indicating boys and girls sections.

The message of toy marketing is that some toys are “naturally” for boys and some for girls, which has a powerful effect on young people. When girls are told they should play only with tiaras, baby dolls and play kitchens, it can reinforce the idea they are meant to be only domestic caretakers, not doctors or scientists. Sadly, the more educational toys — such as construction and science kits — are largely marketed to boys. This is the niche that GoldiBlox is hoping to fill.

As a girl growing up in the 1980s, I was obsessed with princesses and Barbie, but (thanks to my brothers) I also played with LEGOs and GI Joes. Pink princesses aren’t all bad, but girls should have choices about what they want to play with, and it only takes one trip to the toy store to see that the options are stark.

As a mom of a baby girl, I am heartened by the message and mission of GoldiBlox. Even if my daughter wants nothing to do with a construction set, it’s encouraging to know she has the option of having one. As best put in the commercial: “Don’t underestimate girls.”

"Will the Goldieblox ad make little girls dream of being engineers rather than princesses?"

The combination of a Rube Goldberg machine and a reworked Beastie Boys track is certainly fun. With any luck, this ad will raise some girls' aspirations as well as a smile or two

by

Jane Martinson   

November 21st, 2013

The Guardian

US toy company Goldieblox was founded by Stanford engineer Debbie Sterling last year because "girls need more choices than the pink aisle has to offer". The latest ad features three young girls using a selection of pink and pretty toys to set up an elaborate Rube Goldberg contraption - of the kind popularised in recent years in videos by the band OK Go - which runs through the house into the garden outside.

The words, set to the tune of Beastie Boys' Girls, turn the original lyrics on their head: "Girls, you think you know what we want. Girls. Pink and pretty is, girls. Just like the 50s, it's girls."

OK, it's a commercial, selling an interactive book and construction set starring Goldie, a blonde girl who "loves to build". When it launched on YouTube one commenter declared: "I am NOT buying in to the feminist marketing that is in demand". Just Google "girls toys" if you want to see how much that demand is really being met. The top toys are Barbie's "Hairtastic", a Barbie cash register and a Monster High toy that allows children to "add detail to the monster's hair, clothing and skin". Grooming and money, what more could a girl want?

Goldieblox toys are no panacea to the stereotyping of childhood. For a start, the toy is based on the idea that girls need more than just construction to keep them interested, a story about helping friends, say, and there is also quite a lot of pink and purple in the product itself.

But with so much research suggesting that engineering and computer science - two fields becoming more and more important in our digital age - are increasingly male dominated, any effort should be welcomed. A report from the National Science Foundation in America found that 18.2% of computer science degrees were awarded to women in 2010 compared with 29.6% in 1991, while 18.4% of engineering graduates were women in 2010 compared with 15.5% 19 years earlier.

When girls as young as eight start saying that building and construction isn't for them, a toy that shows that they can make cool stuff too can't be a bad idea, can it?

"GoldieBlox Crushes Girl Stereotypes With Jaw-Dropping Engineering Toys"

by

Eliza Murphy

November 20th, 2013

ABC News

Move over Barbie, there’s a new toy in town.

Judging by the insanely instant viral success of GoldieBlox’s new commercial, it’s safe to say the toy company promoting strong, smart, engineer-focused girls with a passion for building is here to stay.

The undeniably catchy re-worked lyrics to Beastie Boys’ 1987 hit, “Girls,” was certainly instrumental in the hugely successful commercial featuring three adorable little girl engineers creating one of the coolest, most elaborate mechanical toys the Internet has ever seen. But the true driving force behind the video was simply the company’s message: “To show the world that girls deserve more choices than dolls and princesses,” and that “femininity is strong and girls will build the future — literally.”

GoldieBlox founder Debbie Sterling is a Stanford engineering grad who was inspired to create toys for girls that offered more options than what is typically found in the “pink aisle.”

After she found herself isolated as one of the few female engineering majors at Stanford in 2005, she had a conversation with a friend, one of the only other females in mechanical engineering, and decided it was time for a change.

That’s when GoldieBlox, the interactive book series and construction set starring Goldie, a kid inventor who loves to build, was born.

“In our culture, the sad truth is that math and science and engineering is a boys’ club, and it starts at such a young age,” Sterling, 30, told GoodMorningAmerica.com. “There’s Bob the Builder, Bill Nye the Science Guy and all these other boy geniuses, but I wanted a role model, a strong character girls can relate to.”

GoldieBlox is single-handedly crushing the typical female stereotypes, working to  increase the miniscule 11 percent of women in engineering today, which Sterling says is “one of the fastest-growing jobs in America.”

“The response has been wonderful,” she explains of her brilliant campaign highlighting the young girls, six engineers and Brett Doar, the mastermind behind OK Go!’s Rube Goldberg machine, turning a normal house in Pasadena, Calif., into a “massive, magical contraption.”

“Girls love it. They are building all kinds of cool things with it,” Sterling added. “It’s bringing a lot of people to tears. So many moms say, ‘I was really good at math,’ or ‘I could have done this, too. My daughter can do anything, but let’s give her the choice I didn’t have.’”

Parents Convince Kids Their Dinosaur Toys Come to Life in Magical ‘Dinovember’

The product is really resonating with dads, too.

“So many dads are looking for ways to really connect with their daughters,” said Sterling. “Sometimes it’s hard or awkward for dads to play with dolls, and they can really bond with their girls over toys like this.”
The music video commercial has already amassed more than 3.5 million views since the company posted it to YouTube on Nov. 17.

“You make something and put it out in the world and cross your fingers,” Sterling said. “The video we made was so ambitious and really hits on this message I wanted to send. We don’t want to bash girls or make them feel ashamed for playing with dolls and playing dress up. I did that when I was little too, but just know there are more options out there for you to explore.”
 
Toys R Us ad...

[NOTE: Once again someone complained and the commercial was pulled. Never trust a link for stability.]

CEO Debbie...

Sheldon Cooper would not approve.

Leonardo's bridge

This is an English translation of a paper that was proposed to the Dutch popular science magazine EOS (affiliated to Scientific American) in Sept 2012 and published in that magazine in April 2013.

"A strange bridge by Leonardo" by Dirk Huylebrouck

Remarkable engineering feat

"Costa Concordia in Italy freed from rocks"

September 16th, 2013

BBC NEWS

Engineering officials in Italy say they have succeeded in lifting the cruise ship Costa Concordia free of rocks, 20 months after it ran aground.

Efforts to right the ship, one of the largest and most daunting salvage operations ever undertaken, are continuing through the night.

The vessel has been detached from rocks and moved on to a platform constructed on the sea bed, officials said.

Thirty-two people died when the ship ran aground off the Tuscan coast.

The bodies of two of those killed in the January 2012 disaster, by the island of Giglio, have never been found. There are hopes that they may be located during the operation, although officials said on Monday there was no sign of them so far.

Engineers have never tried to lift such a huge ship - over 951 feet long (290m) - so close to land.

By Monday evening, the vessel had rotated by 20-21 degrees, the officials said.

This means that there is another 44-45 degrees to go before it is upright. However, the officials hope that once it has risen by 24 degrees, the ship will begin righting itself thanks to gravity and to metal boxes attached to the side and filled with water.

The start of this huge operation was potentially the most problematic phase, and the stage that worried the engineers the most, says the BBC's Alan Johnston at the scene.

But now the ship has been broken away from the reef on which she has been lying, the hope is that it will now be possible to rotate the wreck more easily, he adds.

The Italian Civil Protection Authority said the sea and weather conditions had mostly been right for the attempt, but the operation had to be delayed by three hours because of an overnight storm.
Huge challenge

The storm delayed the positioning of a barge carrying a remote control room close to the shipwreck, from where engineers were using pulleys and counterweights to move the Concordia from the steep underwater incline it is resting on.

Sergio Girotto, an engineer working on the project, told reporters on Monday the operation was going smoothly.

"Everything is going according to plan, we are following the plan to sequence. There is no problem whatsoever."
 
The ship could be seen emerging from the water as operators worked to hoist it upright.

Footage from the scene of the salvage operation clearly shows the watermark on the part of the ship that has been submerged for the past 20 months.

More than 50 enormous chains and winches are being used to break the ship - twice as heavy as the Titanic - away from the reef on which it has been lying and roll her up onto her keel.

Engineers will try to roll the ship up using the cables and the weight of water contained in huge metal boxes welded to the ship's sides - a process called parbuckling.

This procedure must be carried out very slowly to prevent further damage to the hull, which has spent more than 18 months partially submerged in 15 metres (50ft) of water and fully exposed to the elements.

Only after the ship is back up on her keel will it be possible to inspect it fully and begin to plan the next stage - the effort to repair and re-float it and eventually tow it away to be destroyed.

The head of the operation, Nick Sloane, told the AFP news agency that it was now or never for the Costa Concordia, because the hull was gradually weakening and might not survive another winter.

If the operation goes wrong, environmentalists warn that toxic substances could leak out into the sea.

There are also concerns that filthy water trapped in the rotting, rusting wreck will pour out as the ship rises.

But booms and nets have been put in place to try to combat any pollution threat in what is a marine national park.

Five people have been convicted of manslaughter over the disaster, and the captain, Francesco Schettino, is currently on trial accused of manslaughter and abandoning ship.

Giglio mayor Sergio Ortelli said that the removal of the Costa Concordia would bring an end to "a huge problem that we have in our port and that we want to solve as soon as we can".

"Islanders can't wait to see the back of it," he said.

On Sunday, prayers for the operation were said during Sunday Mass on the island.

The small island's economy depends hugely on tourism and the presence of the wreck has discouraged visitors.

The salvage project has so far cost more than 600m euros ($800m; £500m) and is expected to cost much more before the operation is complete.

Giovanni de la Fontana...engineer and magician

A water clock.

Wikipedia...

Giovanni Fontana (ca. 1395 – ca. 1455) was a fifteenth-century Venetian physician and engineer who portrayed himself as a magus. He was born in Venice in the 1390s and attended the University of Padua, where he received a his degree in arts in 1418 and his degree in medicine in 1421. University records list him as "Master John, son of Michael de la Fontana". His most famous promoter at the University was the scholastic Paul of Venice. He tells us that the Doge of Venice sent him to Brescia to deliver a message to the condottiere Francesco Carmagnola. He was also employed as the municipal physician by the city of Udine.

Works...

Fontana composed treatises on a diverse array of topics. We have early works of his on water-clocks, sand-clocks and measurement. Fontana composed one of the earliest Renaissance technological treatises, Bellicorum instrumentorum liber. His machine book contains siege engines and fantastic inventions such as a magic lantern and a rocket-propelled bird, fish, and rabbit.

"Giovanni de la Fontana, engineer and magician" by Amelia Carolina Sparavigna

Giovanni de la Fontana [History of Computers...]

Abu Simbel temples...45 years ago

Evicted by Gamal Abdel Nasser's massive damn project the temples were moved to another site. It was a stupendous feat of engineering.

Here are a few moving photos...

Abu Simbel temples [Wikipedia]

Linda Hall Library

Linda Hall Library
Kansas City, Missouri

The previous post was about Huntington Library and I feel obligated to also mention Linda Hall Library which is one of the world's leading collections of science, engineering, and technology repositories. Its collection [over a million volumes] dates from the fifteenth century to the present and includes first editions by Galileo, Newton, and Darwin.

I have used this library for 45 years and must say that in the Fall the grounds are spectacular.

From Wikipedia:

Linda Hall Library is a privately endowed library of science, engineering and technology located in Kansas City, Missouri.

Established in 1946 through the philanthropy of Linda and Herbert Hall (1858-1941), of the Hall-Baker Grain Co., the library has achieved global recognition and stature. The library is open to the public with individual researchers, academic institutions and companies from Kansas City and around the world using the library’s extensive research-level collection. Though not affiliated with its neighbor, the University of Missouri-Kansas City, many students and faculty from UMKC and other local colleges and universities utilize the library each day.

The library's collection includes academic journals, academic conference proceedings, reference works, publications by the government, and technical reports, industrial standards, engineering society conference papers, U.S. patents, and monographs. The library's distinguished History of Science Collection contains first editions of many landmarks of science and technology. Some of the oldest books in the collection date back to the fifteenth century.

The 14 acres surrounding the library are home to over 450 trees representing 58 genera and 165 species. The arboretum and gardens are further embellished by beds of viburnum, tree peonies and Missouri native woodland plants. Seven trees on the property have been designated Greater Kansas City Champion Trees and represent the largest specimens of their species in the metropolitan area: Sweet Birch, European Hornbeam, Hardy Rubber Tree, Double Flowered Horsechestnut, Rivers Purple Beech, Yulan Magnolia, and Anise Leaf Magnolia. The National Wildlife Federation’s Backyard Wildlife Habitat Program has awarded a certificate of merit to the library for its efforts in preserving the natural habitat of the grounds.

The library's William N. Deramus III Cosmology Theater shows images of the cosmos from the Hubble Space Telescope and NASA science missions. These images are delivered via ViewSpace to the library with daily updates (via the internet) that provide the library with new content for visitors.

"The Tazza", one of the largest pieces of malachite in North America, stands as the focal point in the center of the main reading room. Parquet wood floors, warm oak paneling and bookshelves, and large windows that overlook the south lawn provide an inviting and comfortable atmosphere.

Linda Hall Library